Marketers responsible for fuel crisis, NNPC insists

The Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation, NNPC, Saturday, insisted that the current fuel crisis was instigated by petroleum marketers, noting, however, that its increased truck out of the commodity and helped addressed the scarcity.

In a statement in Abuja, Group Managing Director of the NNPC, Mr. Maikanti Baru, maintained that the scarcity was self-inflicted following the sharp practices of some unscrupulous marketers who took to hoarding and diversion of the product.

He said, “We have maintained our position that this scarcity is self-inflicted by marketers. The NNPC has more than 30-day sufficiency of supply of petroleum products, especially PMS and at the current consumption rate of about 27 million to 28 million litres per day, we should be very comfortable until the end of January 2018 even if we don’t import a drop of petrol into this country.”

Baru appealed to marketers who have diverted petroleum products to please be mindful of other Nigerians and desist from profiteering, stressing that the commodity was being sold to marketers at N133.28 per litre apart from their profit margin and a transportation cost of N7.20 per litre.

He urged the marketers to listen to the voice of reasoning to avoid the long arm of the law catching up with them, adding that the Department of Petroleum Resources, DPR, and the Nigeria Security and Civil Defence Corps, NSCDC, had been mandated to invoke the law against any defaulting marketers.

He also appealed to motorists to cooperate with the NNPC in restoring normalcy to the petrol situation by reporting marketers who sell PMS above N145 per litre to the emergency lines of the DPR and NSCDC.

Furthermore, Baru declared that the NNPC had successfully cleared the petrol queues in Abuja and Lagos with the commitment to increase truck-outs to other states to restore normalcy to the petrol supply and distribution across the country.

Baru, who was speaking after monitoring fuel situation across Abuja, said the NNPC would remain focused at ensuring that all the other state capitals are wet with petrol latest by Sunday.

He said, “As far as truck out is concerned, we have more than doubled the number of trucks that are going out into the country. Yesterday, we loaded and distributed products from coastal and strategic inland depots like Jos.

We loaded I,733 trucks yesterday and the actual normal number of trucks we

required to keep the country wet is about 700 but we have been doing 800 to 850 trucks before the petrol scarcity. We have stepped up the number of truck-outs to 1,733 as a minimum and we have sustained this for a week and there will be more than enough products for motorists in the weeks ahead.”

The statement noted that the highpoint of the visit to the filling stations by Baru and his management team was the handing over of two motorists who were caught with 30 jerrycans in their navy colour Golf saloon car to NSCDC for prosecution at the NNPC Super Mega Station at Kubwa expressway.

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